Materials alumnus speaks on radiation detection devices

Manuel Quevedo stands in front of the classroom and speaks to a room full of students.

Manuel Quevedo (Ph.D., ‘02), an alumnus from the UNT Department of Materials Science and Engineering, spoke with graduate students Friday about materials and devices for radiation detection.

Quevedo is a professor and department head of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Texas at Dallas. He also serves as the director of the Flexible and Large Area Nano-electronics Lab where he and his team focus on materials and devices for large area electronics and sensors as well as novel materials for silicon-based technology.

The seminar provided the students with an in-depth look at the need for radiation detectors with high efficiency and wide-area coverage. Specifically, his talk demonstrated that low temperature materials and device technologies used for flexible displays and IoT applications can also be used to enable large-area, high-performance and reliable sensing systems for thermal neutrons, gamma rays, X-rays, and ultraviolet radiation.

The seminar also opened a window for students into what a job in the materials development field might look like as well as the importance of balancing material performance with manufacturing costs.

"Dr. Quevedo’s talk was part of our weekly Graduate Seminar where graduate students are able to dive deeper into the study of materials science, broaden their knowledge beyond their own work and discover potential career or research paths they may not have otherwise considered," said Vijay Vasudevan, chair of the UNT Department of Materials Science and Engineering.